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Western European passenger car market expands in July

Berlin, 16 August 2013

In July new registrations of passenger cars in Western Europe increased by a good 4 per cent to reach 954,300 units. Following April, this is the second month of growth this year. “The positive July result on the Western European passenger car market is a good start for the stabilisation of the automotive business we expected on this important market in the second half of the year. The emerging economic recovery in Western Europe seems to be reflected in the growing demand for passenger cars,” stressed Matthias Wissmann, President of the German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA).

“It is encouraging that in Spain, Portugal and Greece in particular new registrations of passenger cars showed double-digit growth in July. The French market is also expanding again for the first time since October 2011,” Wissmann said.

In Spain the market grew by around 15 per cent, while in Portugal it increased by a little over 17 per cent, and in Greece by over 12 per cent. And growth in Ireland reached triple figures (+163 per cent). Demand for passenger cars rose by nearly 1 per cent in France. Car sales in Italy were only around 2 per cent down on 2012. In the United Kingdom, registrations of new passenger cars showed another double-digit rise (+13 per cent) – the fourth in succession. Registrations of new cars in Germany climbed by a good 2 per cent.

Total new registrations in Western Europe in the first seven months of the current year came to almost 7.5 million passenger cars but stayed a good 5 per cent below last year’s figure (7.0 million units).

The two major automobile markets, the USA and China, are clearly still continuing their expansion. In the USA, sales of light vehicles in July showed the first double-digit increase since January, rising by 14 per cent to reach a good 1.3 million units. Once again light trucks were the main driver of growth on the US vehicle market – July sales in this segment climbed by just over 15 per cent to 669,200 new vehicles. The passenger car market also increased its growth rate again last month – new car sales climbed by over 12 per cent to 640,100. Since the beginning of the year demand for light vehicles in the USA has risen by somewhat more than 8 per cent, now exceeding 9.1 million units. Sales of new light trucks increased by around 12 per cent to almost 4.6 million by the end of July. Passenger car sales rose by a good 5 per cent to more than 4.5 million units.

In China over 1.1 million new vehicles were sold in July, which was a year-on-year rise of over 16 per cent. The figure for the first seven months showed an increase of nearly 20 per cent, taking sales of new vehicles to a volume of almost 8.9 million units.

The Indian passenger car market lost just over 8 per cent in July. A total of 186,200 new vehicles were sold. From January to July 2013, vehicle sales fell by almost 10 per cent to a little more than 1.5 million units.

In Japan, July registrations of new passenger cars sank by nearly 10 per cent, down to 401,900 vehicles – the level from July last year was clearly boosted by the environmental bonus. This year so far, sales of new cars are around 9 per cent below the 2012 level, at just over 2.7 million.

Russian sales of light vehicles decreased once again. In all 234,600 vehicles were sold in July, so new registrations were over 8 per cent down on last year’s level. So far this year, sales of light vehicles in Russia have fallen to around 1.6 million units (-6 per cent).

In Brazil new registrations of lightvehicles slumped byaround 8 per cent in July, to 324,300 units. However, July of last year had produced a very strong result due to government incentives. From January to July this year, the volume of new registrations grew bynearly 3 per cent to exceed 2 million vehicles.